This year the Consumer Electronics Show (CES)– an international consumer electronics and technology innovation trade fair – was celebrating its 50th anniversary. The January Las Vegas event, which venue extends over close to 250.000m2, can sometimes almost overwhelm its audience with its vast and varied array of innovative technologies but it serves as a valuable indicator of the technology trends that are now helping to propel corporate transformation and drive changes in consumer behaviour. Last year self-driving connected cars were the stars of CES, but this year artificial intelligence (AI) topped the polls by a long way, with the prospect of integration into tomorrow's road vehicles confirmed by announcements from Santa Clara, USA-based tech company Nvidia. Indeed the company's AI technology can now be embedded in'smart' co-pilot systems for car drivers. It can also be integrated into the virtual assistant systems that help users on a daily basis, incorporated into your'smart home' and its connected objects, underpinning the voice commands that regulate the temperature and lighting levels and close doors at your house, and can also order you a taxi.

Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own. The author is a Forbes contributor. The opinions expressed are those of the writer. Attendees view vehicles manufactured by 3D printing at the 2017 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas.David Paul Morris/Bloomberg Much of the focus in the technology world currently is on artificial intelligence, machine learning and big data – and how they will affect the way we use products and how machines operate. But developing just as quickly, although with slightly less hype, is 3D printing or additive manufacturing (AM), which is going to have at least as big an impact on how we make things as AI et al.

If two junior Navy officers have their way, the warships of the future will be floating factories that create everything from food to robots and spare parts -- all thanks to 3-D printers. Shipyards will use them on a vast scale. And when the ships need more raw materials, they'll link up with "biomining" ships that harvest raw materials from the sea. Writing in Proceedings, the influential journal of the U.S. Naval Institute, the pair write that the growth of 3-D printing machines could change almost everything about how the Navy builds stuff "through the design and construction of ships, submarines, aircraft, and everything carried on board." On a smaller scale, they write that 3-D printers could change the way the Navy handles logistics and the way it produces tools, components and supplies for its ships.

Right now, the typical 3D printer is a tool for making plastic objects. Assembling them in layers according to a pre-programmed plan, the printers can quickly make weirdly shaped parts, but they're often limited to working with just one material at a time. Additive manufacturing, as 3D printing is also known, offers so much more. A new printer, created by MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL), can print up to 10 materials into a single object --and incorporate other, finished parts directly into the design-- all at a fraction of the cost of complex industrial 3D printers Their new printer, known as the MultiFab, is a system of systems. A central computer runs the printing program, but as it does so it receives feedback from 3D scanners and machine vision, which map the object as it's being made, allowing the computer to adjust the printing process and materials accordingly.

The aptly named 3D printer scanner, Zeus, may be a game changer in getting 3-dimensional printers into the consumer market. Invented at the University of Southern California's new incubator/accelerator, Viterbi Startup Garage, the team comes from a unique mix of robotics, artificial intelligence, and computer vision) and appears to be pushing the envelope, so to speak, in creating a multi-functional, all-in-one, 3D printer. You can check out the Kickstarter project: ZEUS: The World's First ALL-IN-ONE 3D Copy Machine. I am on my way over to the USC Viterbi Startup Garage this afternoon and I'm sure it will be an exciting visit considering that their Kickstarter project exceeded its $100,000 goal in 24 hours. Overfunding in the Kickstarter realm often means a project will catch a lot of attention and gain tremendous momentum.

Forget selfies burnt into toast and marshmallows printed with your portrait, the next trend will be to have your face immortalised on a pancake. A research and design team has created a concept 3D printer that combines facial recognition with a hot plate and layers of batter to create complex images. And the printing has the capability to be perfectly timed using algorithms so the lighter and darker tones of the face are captured, and cooked, with precision. The idea was developed by research and innovation experts at Bristol-based Kinneir Dufort. It uses Computer Numerical Control (CNC) technology to convert online designs into numbers, similar to coordinates on a graph.

A smart home full of devices connected to each other, as well as domestic robots are closer than we think, according to one futurologist. This year has seen a rush in the popularity of smart gadgets, with items like 3D printers and smart thermostats making it onto Christmas lists for the first time. The trend is a sign of the way technology will accelerate in 2015, according to London-based futurologist Dr James Bellini. Tipping pint: According to a recent survey, 26 per cent if people are most looking forward to getting a robot helper in the home. Technology giant Honda already has a domestic robot, Asimo (left).

Most 3-D printers use a single material to fabricate objects. For consumer 3-D printers, that generally means some kind of plastic or resin. But using only one kind of material means 3-D printers are limited in the kinds of objects they can create. There are 3-D printers that can use multiple materials, but they can cost tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars, putting them out of reach for almost everyone besides engineers and developers. A team at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory wanted to find a way to create a more affordable multi-material 3-D printer, and thus the MultiFab was born.

But the technology is still far behind in reliably producing a variety of useful objects, with no assembly required, at a moderate cost. In recent years, companies have been working to tackle some of these challenges with "multi-material" 3-D printers that can fabricate many different functional items. Such printers, however, have traditionally been limited to three materials at a time, can cost as much as $250,000 each, and still require a fair amount of human intervention. But this week, researchers at MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) say that they've found a way to make a better, cheaper, more user-friendly printer. In a paper accepted at the SIGGRAPH computer-graphics conference, a CSAIL team presented a 3-D printer that can print an unprecedented 10 different materials at once by using 3-D-scanning techniques that save time, energy, and money.

Read about the world's tallest building, the longest bicycle, the most modern tractor and a discovered time capsule that cannot be opened until the year 2957. Shoe manufacturer New Balance is stepping onto the 3-D printing platform with a new running shoe that incorporates a 3-D printed midsole that can be customized to each runner. New Balance is making the shoe available for the first time in Boston in April, 2016 -- timed to coincide with the Boston Marathon. It's difficult to believe that with all of the unrest in Iraq, a company such as AMBS Architects would propose building a skyscraper to rival Dubai's Burj Khalifa, which stands 830-meters high. But here it is: the 1,152-meter-tall Bride's tower. The building is being suggested for Basra, located in the south of Iraq -- a rapidly growing center for business.